Since 2015, the DovahQueen has been taking your questions and giving advice to improve your games. Now the tables are turned in this DovahQueen series; Loren is asking the questions and a panel of guests answers. It’s time to Bend the Knee!

First, let’s meet today’s guests.

Guests – The Danger Club Podcast

The Danger Club Podcast is the show that takes Pathfinder and drives it like we stole it. We don’t play one single Adventure Path, instead we play loads of short adventures chosen by our listeners and tie them together into one big campaign. Take a bunch of British actors, put them in a studio in an old Georgian mansion, add in music and SFX, and then start throwing dice, that’s the Danger Club. It’s the show that feels like your home game, amped up to 11. Sure, it’s a story about saving the world, but it’s also about starting a riot in a post office, going undercover in a cult and kidnapping a familiar because it was creepy towards the Alchemist’s mum.

Scott is a cabaret host, James is an historian, Colin is musician, Ross does ALL the voices, Drum is the Santa your mother warned you about and Dan is just trying to hold it all together. Add in a bunch of guests from TV and Comedy and you have a show that is full of energy and packed with complex characters, high drama, and plenty of laughs.

After converting to Pathfinder 2^nd Edition on day one of the game’s release the DCP is now one of the longest running continuous PF2 podcasts in the world, bringing an hour of adventure every Monday. Our playthrough of The Slithering is just getting underway so it’s a perfect time to jump on. You can join the Club wherever you get podcasts or at https://www.dangerclubpodcast.com/ You can also join us for our weekly livestream Dangerous Wednesdays where we talk about RPGs, give GM advice, review games, and talk to guests from the RPG industry. DW airs every Wednesday at 7pm UK/2pm EST/11am PST on https://www.twitch.tv/dangerclubpodcast

Dan Thompson aka The Dangeon Master

Hi, I’m Dan and I’m the host and GM for The Danger Club Podcast. I have been playing RPGs since I was 10 years old, back in the AD&D days. I’ve played everything from Vampire to Warhammer over the decades but settled on Pathfinder a few years ago after falling in love with the world of Golarion, I love the Lost Omens setting and there is no limit to the amount of time I can spend reading Pathfinder lore so that we can mess with it on the show. These days I run the Danger Club Podcast as well as appearing on the other shows on our network. I also run as much Starfinder as I can find time for among everything else!

Outside of gaming I can usually be found working as a presenter or watching far too much Formula One.

Scott Wilson-Besgrove, aka Wolfgang Hemingway

I have played ttrpgs for close to a decade now, having started the Danger Club Podcast in the past couple of those, also guesting on Power Word Roll and Sabotage the DM.

In my other life, as a cabaret host and immersive actor, I also used to be a tree surgeon.

Today’s Question

“Just the other day, while checking your mail, you found a small advertisement for a new pet shop near where the mall used to be. ‘Lucky Friends Little Shoppe’ and there’s a coupon for ‘One Free New Friend.’ You arrive about an hour after the store opens. Gerbils, rabbits, fish, and shelter-cats greet you as you walk in the door. The adorable faces of the would-be pets is a stark contrast to the visage of the woman behind the counter. ‘Welcome, welcome to me shop! Please have a look around an’ let me know if you’ll be needin’ any help! The name’s Geerda.’ You say thanks and that you will. ‘Would ya’ like to see my more exotic friends in the back?’ She takes you into a back room that’s pitch black. With a flip of a light switch, she brings the lights on—the black-lights. All manner of wild and fantastic beasts glow in fluorescent colors. ‘Do any of these strike yer fancy? Yer coupin is good on these too, but I’ll be politely asking that ya be getting your feed and bedding from me.”

Geerda’s backroom contains all animals and magical beasts from any published tabletop roleplaying game. Which one do you pick as your new pet and why? Most importantly, what do you name it?

Answers

Dan

Ok, hear me out. Monkey Swarm. Not a single monkey, a monkey swarm. There are lots of people who might think this is a poor choice and that I should have chosen something like a dragon or a teleporting dog. Those people are wrong. Let me explain.

1. It counts as one creature but it’s actually hundreds of the little psychopaths. Enjoy your coupon Geerda, I just bagged a bargain.
2. A monkey swarm will bear me no loyalty. People who demand love from their pets are cowards. The monkeys are the perfect manifestation of the chaos of modern life and through battling them in order to accomplish basic tasks I will grow stronger.
3. Strategic classical warfare applications. How many monkeys are there in a swarm? 300. The same as the number of Spartans that held the pass of Thermopylae against and army of 300,000 Persians. Think you’re invading Greece on my watch? How about you get through my monkeys first! Before you ask, no I didn’t watch the end of that movie, I was too busy making tiny red cloaks and pants for my monkey Spartans.
4. Naming possibilities. All of the monkeys will be named Kevin. No Kevin 1, Kevin 2, Kevin 3 or anything like that, they are simians, not numbers dammit! They will all be called Kevin and when I address them along the lines of “Kevin, bring me that bagel” it will be up to them to work out which specific Kevin I am talking to. Upon deciding which of them is to bring the bagel they will then refuse to do so (see point 2). Once this is established, I will take the swarm of Kevins to Starbucks and order a latte under that name. When the barista calls out the order, 300 monkeys (plus any human Kevins in the vicinity) will descend on the counter and attempt to claim their prize. There is not tangible benefit to me from this, I just really want to see it.
5. Literary aptitude. It is a known fact that if you put an infinite number of monkeys in a room with an infinite number of typewriters, eventually they will produce the complete works of Shakespeare. 300 of them should at least be able to churn out a passable Transformers script.
6. Political goals. 300 seats is more than enough to take control of the US House of Representatives, allowing me to have monkey swarms legally declared better than dragons and force CBS to bring back the 90s detective series Due South. All that’s required is to run 300 successful congressional election campaigns where the candidate is a screaming capuchin who throws their own poo. Challenge accepted.
7. Has Sir David Attenborough ever made a documentary about griffons or a blink dogs? No. But he’s made blooming loads of them about monkeys. Having a monkey swarm at my side drastically increases my chances of meeting Attenborough, upon which we will invariably bond over our shared opinion that griffons are rubbish.

Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk. If you have any questions, please address them to Kevin.

Scott

Geerda speaks but I barely listen. All around me are things with maws, paws and claws, some pulsing with sentience and others pulsing with the fluorescent lights that have just been switched on. Standing there under the Stunned condition I gawp at the black light reveal and revel in the majesty of the magical mammals massed before me.

There is one.

One that is sleek. One that is small. One that may well have a higher Int score than I. One that could be a beacon of eccentricity in a roiling sea of mundanity.

I kneel. Partly because it is currently on the ground and partly because I simply cannot be one hundred percent sure that this creature isn’t royal in some way shape or form. And WHAT form. Fur, cut from cloud. Feathers, plucked from Elysium. Eyes, amethyst stones that speak to my heart and betray my thoughts and feelings before they have even registered in my own cerebellum.

There is a prook, and with that one curious sound I am smitten in a way that low words over the darkest red wine by candlelight in regal halls could never get me. And I KNOW this little fella is a Malbec kinda guy.

Shakily handing over my coupon like a man encountering his first Illithid, I open the luxurious looking box (complete with its own hanging sage and paw-besmirched salt circle).

Glittering purple eyes challenge me as the first steps are taken out. An indignant mow is given as the thing steps back in again, despite my crooned assurance that outside the box is, in fact, better than inside the box. This action repeats itself one more time, and the ritual is complete.

The tressym takes steps outside, regally flicks its wings back across its furry body, and, with one more indigo-indignant look at me, flips onto its back and promptly starts licking its own bum.

“Yes.” I say. “I will take this one.”

“Ah!” Geerda beams. “You’ve taken a liking to that one eh? They say he’s looking for a familiar. Raspurrtin, his name is.”

“Yes…” I mutter, watching the winged feline roll around on its back in a desperate attempt to capture its tail, perhaps in an archetypal dance meant to punish traitorous gunmen from a long-forgotten age.

“…of course he is.”

And I begin to look forward to the next one hundred years.

 

I’ve heard from my guests; now I want to hear from you. What’s your style? Leave a comment below, on our Discord, or on Know Direction’s Facebook page.